Remembering 9/11: Constructing The Future

NEW YORK, NY - AUGUST 24: Construction continues on the National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the World Trade Center site on August 24, 2011 in New York City. The memorial features two reflecting pools on the footprints of the twin towers. The memorial is scheduled to be dedicated on September 11, 2011, the tenth anniversary of the World Trade Center terrorist attacks.(Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images

Kim and I wanted to salute the 9/11 remembrance this weekend in a way that looked toward the future, a message of hope and growth from that terrible day 10 years ago. One way was to talk to the people building the Freedom Tower and surrounding buildings in lower Manhattan.

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Upon getting out of the subway at World Trade, the Freedom Tower is the first thing that strikes you. They have started putting in glass in the lower floors and it looks so much more like a building than something under construction. It gave us chills.

We stopped several construction workers and asked about how it felt working on the building. You got an immediate sense that this was more than just a construction job, the feeling went deeper. For one worker, the building has become a goal for his family, with his brother and son on the job and his father having working on the original World Trade Center.

One other construction worker’s family has a strong connection with World Trade. His father was an iron worker on the original World Trade Center, his brother and son are working on some of the other buildlngs.